Chicago's Best Loved Ballet Comes to DC
This year sees The Joffrey Ballet's classic Nutcracker, as choreographed by Robert Joffrey and Gerlad Arpino in 1987, receive its last performance run before a major reinvention next year by Christopher Wheeldon. It has become the definitive Chicago Nutcracker, and is making a special visit to Washington DC's Kennedy Center Opera House this November, playing for five dates only.
The entire Company will be joined on stage by local children and DC area youth choir members. It's time to revel in the awe-inspiring Nutcracker with brilliant costumes, larger than life scenery, entrancing storytelling and of course, Tchaikovsky's famous score, played by the Kennedy Center Opera House Orchestra.
What is The Nutcracker About?
Set in Victorian-era Chicago, our story starts at the elegant home of the Stahlbaums, where a Christmas soiree is getting into swing. The children are excited, especially when the toymaker Herr Drosselmeyer arrives with beautiful dolls for them. To the eldest girl Clara he presents a beautiful wooden nutcracker soldier. Dancing with it, she is delighted - until her boisterous younger brother Fritz grabs it and breaks its jaw. Devastated, Clara tries to fix the doll with her hankerchief.
Soon it is getting late, and the guests are leaving; Clara settles down under the Christmas tree with the nutcracker and falls asleep. At midnight she is awakened by the sound of pattering; the clock strikes 12 and she finds that the tree has grown to a magnificent size, and that she is surrounded by full-sized mice and rats, led by a dastardly king. They are armed with swords and ready to close in, but look! A squadron of tin soldiers march in, led by none other than the Nutcracker, who has transformed into a handsome prince!
Together they defeat the mice in an almighty battle, with Clara throwing her slipper at the king himself. To thank Clara for her help, the prince leads her on a magical sleigh ride to a snowy forest, where they meet glittering snowflakes and angels. They carry on to the Land of Sweets, where awaits the benevolent Sugar Plum Fairy, her Cavalier and a host of sweet treats from across the world, who are ready to put on the dance spectacle of Clara's wildest dreams.
